


Heroes

by sinistrocular



Series: Heroes [1]
Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-24
Updated: 2014-02-24
Packaged: 2018-01-13 14:41:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1230256
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinistrocular/pseuds/sinistrocular
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aramis could still remember the first day at the garrison, how he stood among fresh-faced boys as they all eagerly awaited their future. At seventeen, he sold his life in the name of honor and glory and heroism. Soldiers were heroes; he had heard all the noble tales of their exploits and the king needed an army of heroes to fight in a war should hostilities between the Swedes and Poles cross their paths. After all, France conquered every molehill that stood in their way; other nations feared their power and Aramis’s chest swelled with pride at the thought of serving in the world’s finest army. Of course, he expected long days of training, a brotherhood deeper than the blood of family, and the undying fire of loyalty to his country and king to propel him through any trial he might face.</p>
<p>However, Aramis certainly did not expect the brilliant blue eyes of the cadet next to him nor the clarity of his fellow’s voice as he asked with all the naive energy of a boy not much younger than him, “Is this your first day?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heroes

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the song ["Heroes" by David Bowie](http://youtu.be/Tgcc5V9Hu3g) and [this gifset by shoesofmoriarty](http://juanborgia.co.vu/post/77645666735/in-his-own-eyes-hes-a-coward-and-a-deserter) as well as the idea of becoming disillusioned.
> 
> There have been several requests on tumblr for some Aramis/Marsac fic so I thought I could help out with that.

Aramis could still remember the first day at the garrison, how he stood among fresh-faced boys as they all eagerly awaited their future. At seventeen, he sold his life in the name of honor and glory and heroism. Soldiers were heroes; he had heard all the noble tales of their exploits and the king needed an army of _heroes_ to fight in a war should hostilities between the Swedes and Poles cross their paths. After all, France conquered every molehill that stood in their way; other nations feared their power and Aramis’s chest swelled with pride at the thought of serving in the world’s finest army. Of course, he expected long days of training, a brotherhood deeper than the blood of family, and the undying fire of loyalty to his country and king to propel him through any trial he might face.

However, Aramis certainly did not expect the brilliant blue eyes of the cadet next to him nor the clarity of his fellow’s voice as he asked with all the naive energy of a boy not much younger than him, “Is this your first day?”

Such a strange thing to be so enchanted by an inane common day phrase but his mouth dried at something so simple. His entire world condensed around him and he memorized everything about the moment. Even later, after years of wondering, he could still perfectly remember how young and free Marsac looked then, how unburdened, how joyful. He had not yet become disillusioned and cynical from battle after battle, seeing so many comrades with their brands painted across tree and man alike. Nor had a massacre in the night stolen the light from this blue eyes. Or a ball of lead shut them forever.

When he could find his voice again, Aramis croaked, “Yes.”

Quite insightful, really, his first words to Marsac were, but he recovered quick enough to manage. “Aramis.”

With a delightful smile, the boy replied brightly, “Marsac.”

Over the days and weeks that followed, the two became nigh inseparable, brothers before their training even finished, and Aramis knew part of it stemmed not only from that mutual desire for brotherhood and camaraderie but a chemistry that neither could properly shake. He supposed they were lucky to find themselves in the same battalion with a number of young boys all vying to save France from the evils of the world, all bright faces full of the cheer of ones who had never seen battle before. They left Paris without a care in the world and their minds full of visions of romantic wars. Many nights on the road were spent telling the stories of old, rejoicing in joining the stuff of legends.

On night in particular, Aramis retired early for a cough that had settled deep in his chest. His tent mate returned and Aramis did not bother hiding the smile that took up his face. Something about Marsac made him feel warm and safe and simply having him there made the itch in his throat dim to less than a tickle. His heart soared in the quiet of the glade around them, a song pressed against his lips despite not having much of a singing voice to carry it. Between them, there was never much need for words, for Marsac chose his so carefully and Aramis knew he did not particularly care for idle small talk.Their conversations were rich with intellectual delights and philosophies about spirituality and the church and Aramis had never quite met a man or boy like him. 

“Do you think we’ll be heroes, Aramis?” That night was no different than many others before and Aramis beamed over at Marsac for his question. 

He had never considered it concretely before, but Aramis joined the army for the same reason as nearly every other boy there. Still, between the training and largely unimportant tasks for such a green battalion, they had yet to see the true face of battle. Aramis, at least, had considered that they may never fight if the war danced all around them. 

“If conquering beans is considered a great deed, then I am a hero already.” He offered a joke in return, if only to see a smile grace Marsac’s face.

It did and underneath the bright mirth laid a scalding desire, so much so that Aramis had to knot his hands in his blankets to refrain from moving from his bedroll.

“Aramis,” Marsac sighed as he tugged off his boots and laid down beside him, leaving Aramis’s self-control and discipline straining to hold in the urge to close the distance between then.

With a fond smile, Aramis properly answered the question the second time around, “I suppose. We do fight for France and all her people.”

“Mmm,” his tent mate hummed in agreement. “I would not want to be our enemy.”

“Yes, to face such handsome men as us on the battlefield.” Marsac smacked his arm jovially for that one. 

“Do you think you could ever, y’know, kill a man?” The fire sparking between them dimmed to a low simmer and Aramis no longer needed to fight against his body to stay on his bedroll.

Aramis had seen a dead man only once before in his life: a beggar on the street in the cold of winter. The night before, he had been alive, if shivering, and Aramis had wished him a good night as he passed him on the way to his home where his mother had waited long enough for her prowler of a son to return for the night. It had been bitter that night, even with his bed pushed up near the fireplace for warmth, and the niggling regret in his mind kept him up that night. Should he ask the man outside to come in? Wasn’t that what Christ had taught? To not turn away from those in need? He knew there was room enough in the churches to house those who froze in the night, but they refused to let such dirty, hoveled creatures into their world of golden spires and stained glass. The next morning, the man laid still outside against the wall opposite their door, stiff and chilled as the stone behind him.

But killing a man was a matter all on its own. Aramis had never seen much blood in his life, much less ripped it from a man while he still breathed. Certainly, he had no doubt that he could fight just as any other capable soldier, like any other boy in their battalion, but kill? He did not know if he would when it came down to it, to choose to slice open another human’s guts and spill them out onto the battlefield, to rob a mother of her son.

“If it was required of me, yes,” Aramis replied, his voice shaking in the quiet between them.

“Does it make me a coward to wish it never comes to that?” Marsac pulled down his walls, laid bare in front of his friend, his brother who he trusted with something deeper than just smiles and jokes.

His chest warmed, deeper than the desire he felt so plainly for the other soldier. It blossomed underneath that, filled in the cracks of his armor, made him whole. He had always seen those cracks as a weakness, where water leaked in despite every attempt to close it up, but now he could see that those fractures let light in as well as the dirt and mud. If he pried them a little farther open, he might see more of that radiant light.

“No, it doesn’t make you a coward.” Aramis shook his head, but his gaze never left Marsac.

Less than a week later, they faced their first real battle in a shock of musket fire, blood, and pain. Marsac disappeared into the sea of death and only after the tide washed back out did he find his friend alive despite every inch of Aramis telling him that he had lost him. That night, Marsac wept bitterly against his shoulder and Aramis held him tight, roughened hands sliding through auburn curls until he fell asleep. He would never judge him for that night nor any other for the tears shed, even as he swallowed his own down. Somehow, hearing Marsac vent his emotions allowed Aramis to remain a calm, steady presence throughout the storm of grief that shook Marsac.

“I killed a man today, Aramis,” were the only words spoken in the tent that night.

Aramis remembered that morning after, when he woke up curled around Marsac, nose buried in his shoulder. Oh how he could still yet recall how panic set his stomach on fire; friends did not lie together like this. Had his body betrayed him in the night or otherwise answered the siren call that was everything about Marsac? The long minutes between his waking and Marsac’s would never leave his mind, not for a hundred years without the sound of his voice. Nor would he ever want them to, for as soon as Marsac woke, his entire world turned upside down. 

The kiss had been clumsy but gentle and so filled with with the incandescence of Marsac’s inner fire that Aramis had been convinced had been extinguished by the blood of the battle. Marsac’s lips questioned his in that first kiss, asked for permission for something Aramis had wanted since the day he met him. Still, for all of Aramis’s charm and banter, he found that he could only return the kiss with his own inexperience. Luckily, it had been short but still left both of them smiling for days on end, helped renew their spirits in the face of battle after battle. They held each other up with their budding love, carried the burdens when the other could not, and made their canvas tent a sacred temple where they could speak or do anything. 

As the conflict raged on, however, there was only so much their budding love could do. They were not heroes, they were not knights or kings, they were but boys trying to stay alive and soon they wished they would never see another fight or another friend fall under a sword.

Weeks became months.

Weeks became months and Aramis watched as his friend and lover became jaded and scarred. As much as he missed the boy he felt he had grown up with in the war, the man who emerged grew only more beautiful in his eyes. Blue eyes that had been bright with naivety became pools of wisdom and a comfort on nights when Aramis could hardly sleep for the nightmares that woke both of them even though Marsac’s lips had blessed his eyelids in a silent benediction for peaceful sleep. 

When they finally returned to Paris, they both had changed a great deal, but they did so together and, in the privacy of four solid walls, they consummated what began in a tent so many months ago. With only one week before they returned to a life of sword and musket, they lived in relative luxury for all the fresh food and drink they could enjoy. Bottles of wine littered the floor around the bed they returned to every few hours, rattling with the sounds their love made in the room around them. Aramis took to sex like an artist to a blank canvas or composer to his staff, except his great paintings were made of the way Marsac’s hands twisted in the sheets and his symphonies the mix of their voices hitched high in ecstasy.

Returning to the battlefield cast a dreary shadow over them but Aramis refused to let the fire that blazed so bright in private to die away. They learned to love quietly, in glances and whispered words and the faintest of touches, and Aramis could never love him less for any night Marsac felt the weight of the war on his shoulders. He would simply hold him, stroke his arm, hum the soft songs of his heart until sleep took them both. After another long year, Aramis finally realized that Marsac was not meant for the battlefield, as much as he hated to admit it. No longer did the war hold promises of glory and honor and heroism, but they were no longer bright-eyed boys who sought such things; the only thing Aramis wanted at the end of the day was to return to their canvas temple and find Marsac still healthy and whole. But he knew he could never truly be so while death rained around them. They had to get out of the army one way or another.

No sooner had he wished it when the next day a dagger met his ribcage in a terrible flume of blood and pain. Long nights they spent in a different tent, Marsac by his side as Aramis healed at a snail’s pace. _At least it did not pierce your heart,_ they told him more times than he could count, but Aramis could not consider it lucky. For he was to return to Paris, discharged, but without his nearest and dearest friend.

Before, he and Marsac had rarely fought more than a short verbal spar and eventual compromise. After such a grisly wound, they could hardly speak without returning to the subject of Aramis’s impending discharge and how he wanted to stay with Marsac, even if it meant fighting wounded. Marsac, of course, would have no such thing, preferring his lover to stay alive at any cost. That Christmas was spent in near-silence, neither daring to say anything to provoke another argument. The new year brought little peace, for the day before Aramis was to depart for Paris, they were laid siege to again and he joined the fight despite Marsac’s patience with him wearing quite thin.

As usual, Marsac was right. A musket ball in Aramis’s shoulder seemed to finish any possible future career as a soldier. He returned to Paris within the fortnight, without Marsac, without the light that illuminated his path and warmed his heart to the point of bursting. The months without him dragged like a funeral and the hope that the other would return happy, healthy, and whole dwindled into nothing. Life would have to go on, with or without Marsac. His days darkened into blurry messes of darkness and fear, with no reprieve from the weight of Marsac’s absence from his bed.

The sun rose full on Easter morning and Aramis to the touch of dry lips against his. Eyelids fluttered open, searching for blue and found them there, hollow but there.

“I’m joining the King’s Musketeers,” were the first words Marsac said to him since the night before a musket ball ruined any plans of Aramis continuing his life as a soldier. 

Blinking up at his friend, his brother, his lover, Aramis could not bring himself to care how Marsac returned but instead rejoiced at the sound of his voice and the chance to make things right between them.

“They’re stationed in Paris,” Marsac explained after the most delicious breakfast Aramis had ever taste. “So I’ll need a place to stay.”

Aramis smiled for what felt like the first time in years as he cupped a scruffy cheek with a hand that had grown softer with disuse and long days in bed. His heart burned white-hot in his chest and he knew he could never turn Marsac away, not now, not ever.

“I just so happen to have a vacancy in my bed.” He smiled ever brighter and felt the weight lift from his shoulders as Marsac returned it, though his eyes had long ago become shadowed with the blood of enemies and comrades alike.

“No one’s seen fit to fill it?” Marsac graced his lips with another kiss, but despite the many shared between them in the hollowed ground of their tent, it seemed as clumsy as their first. It was nervous and insecure and everything Aramis never wanted his lover to feel again. They had bared their souls together, grown up together, become _men_ together; Aramis could never want for a better friend and companion in this life or the next.

“No one is fit to fill it but you.” He sealed his lips over Marsac’s, ending the argument as well as initiating a much-needed tumble in the sheets. In their time apart, Marsac had grown to doubt himself and how much of Aramis’s heart he had stolen away in the night, but Aramis sought to reassure him with every touch and kiss and confession of love.

“I’ve heard they’re quite the heroes,” Aramis spoke long after they both found release, his uninjured arm slung around his lover’s shoulders.

With a rise of his eyebrows, Marsac almost looked like that boy he met what felt like years and years ago for a hope that brightened behind those blue eyes. For a moment, he did not look so scarred and jaded and worn.

“Heroes?” His lover replied with an infectious warmth in his voice. “I didn’t know those still existed.”

**Author's Note:**

> There is a planned second part of this that will span the time between Marsac becoming a musketeer (and spoiler alert Aramis becomes one too) and the end of 1x04. I apologize for any historical inaccuracies, but I tried to keep to the characters more than the rising tensions/wars going on at the time. I'm still feeling a little iffy on this one and you may see a few edits in the near-future but the "plot" will largely be untouched.
> 
> Also keep an eye out for some more Aramis/Porthos I have in the mix based on 1x05 feelings.
> 
> As usual, I'm sinistrocular @ tumblr if you're curious but I mostly reblog things.


End file.
